CafePress Adds New Products

Posted on November 3rd, 2006 by thetshirtnexus.
Categories: CafePress.

Posted Today (but hinted about at CPConnect):

Hi Shopkeepers,

Surprise! Just in time for the Holidays – we’re pleased to announce new merchandise! We’ve added more colors and women’s long sleeved t-shirt. Check out the new merchandise:

• Women’s Long Sleeve T-shirt (White)
• Women’s Long Sleeve Dark T-shirt (Black and Brown)
• Men’s Long Sleeve Dark T-shirt (Black, Navy, and Ash Grey)
• Dark T-shirt (Navy and Military Green – are already found under the Dark T-shirt)

Selling Tip:
Create a “New Arrival” or “What’s New” section on your shop to showcase new merchandise with your best selling designs. It’s a quick way to get your new merchandise in front of your customers while you add the new merchandise to your sections.

Add these products to your shop today!

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Microsoft Ad Center First Impressions

Posted on November 2nd, 2006 by thetshirtnexus.
Categories: Advertising.

While at eComXpo (related post) I picked up a coupon for $50 of advertising with Microsoft Ad Center.

After a $5 signup fee, I was all set to create ads. I thought I’d give you my quick first impressions.

The Interface

I was happy with the interface, it was straight forward. I created a campaign and then an “order” which contained ads and keywords.

Setting Preferences

I liked the tools they had in place to create keywords and negative keywords. I also appreciated the ad preview on the right side of the screen which was updated as I typed in my variables.

Bonus Tool

The Keyword Generation Tool, listed under a tab called “Research”:

This tool will automatically generate keywords based on the word or website address you type. Please only select keywords which meet editorial guidelines and do not infringe upon trademarks owned by other parties.

I gave this a shot for the page I wanted folks to land on and got some great results with stats on how many times someone search for those words.
My first impression? Favorable, quite favorable. I really appreciated the keyword The proof shall be in the pudding as the saying goes though, we’ll see how my test ad performs.

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4 Lists for Getting Your Shop Ready for the Holidays

Posted on November 1st, 2006 by thetshirtnexus.
Categories: Marketing, Website Tips.


Yep, it’s that time already, Halloween is just over but you need to get your shop ready for Hanukkah, Christmas and Kwanzaa!

CafePress Tips
CafePress has already put up their tips on this handy Holiday Prep page. They have a lot of information including a “4 Day Program” guide which includes these topic highlights:

  • The right keyword can lead shoppers straight from a search engine to your shop
  • Target the Traffic
  • Add your top-selling merchandise to your shop for the Holiday season
  • Group your merchandise and shoppers will love you for it
  • Top Ten Holiday Products
  • Tag your images with words that work
  • Dress up your shop for the Holiday rush

5 Mistakes that could ruin your holiday sales
From Microsoft Small Business:

  • Betting too heavily on discount pricing.
  • Spending too little on advertising.
  • Marketing to some customers and not others.
  • Overlooking feedback.
  • Forgetting last-minute shoppers.

Last Minute Site Fix Ups
About.com gives us 5 tips for Last Minute Site Fix Ups

  • Use e-mail or themed e-mail newsletters to offer gift ideas to your current customers.
  • Offer Gift Certificates
  • Offer a discount or promotion for several items if purchased together (i.e. robe, slippers, and pajamas).
  • Discount items that aren’t selling well.
  • Make shipping info easily available.

TnT for TsE’s List
What I’ve already done:

  • Set up some SEO (Search Engine Optimization) terms on my sites
  • Sent out Pre-Holiday Newsletters with hints that shopping time is coming around and a coupon code
  • Purchased offline advertising

What I’ll be doing next:

  • Updating my Google Base feeds
  • Sending out a Christmas themed newsletter
  • Setting up/tweaking online advertising campaigns
  • Following up on PR opportunities

What I’ll do in December and What I’ll do, time willing:

  • Adding Holiday themed decorations to my shops
  • Sending out another newsletter with shipping deadlines
  • Reaching out with grass roots marketing (message boards, etc)

How about you? What have you got planned? Will you be running with any of the ideas listed here?

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Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator Keyboard Shortcut Tips

Posted on October 29th, 2006 by thetshirtnexus.
Categories: Design.

From Tips and Tric…

When creating in Illustrator and Photoshop I often like to look at my designs from different viewpoints.
Here are a few keyboard shortcuts I frequently use.

  • “Ctrl +” and “Ctrl -” (Mac’s use the Command key)
    • “+” Zoom you in and “-” Zooms you out.
      • Zooming out lets you see design elements in relation to each other. Zooming in lets you catch any stray pixels that you might miss.
  • “Ctrl 0″
    • This centers you on your document at the largest size it can fit in your computer window.
  • “Shift Tab”
    • This clears all palettes except the Toolbox so I can get a good enough view of my work without the Text, History, Swatches, etc. panels in my way but at the same time I still have access to the Toolbox

This is by no means an exhaustive list but I was just working on some new designs, used Shift Tab and decided to write a post about it.

If there’s interest, I’ll add more posts like these. Meanwhile, feel free to share your own most used keyboard shortcuts by commenting below!

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CafePress Connect Latest Pictures

Posted on October 26th, 2006 by thetshirtnexus.
Categories: CP Connect.

Looks like this is nearly the last batch of pictures from the first CafePress conference.

This pic is from Hectic’s collection (click on the picture to see it larger and be taken to his flickr set). This was shown during the opening speech by Fred and Maheesh where they showed how CafePress’s website has evolved. I became a CafePress shopkeepr in 2001 and it didn’t look like this so this must have been from 1999 or 2000.

Kristen (Fox Vox) has her flickr set here.

CafePress’s Angela Low, Community Manager and *fabulous* person, has also uploaded some of her personal pictures and tagged them you can see those as well as the official CafePress photographer’s pictures and everyone else’s in this flickr tag set.

Off of the flickr system you can see pictures from Jean (Rotem Gear), over on her hosted page.

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McDonald’s Money Making Post - Follow Up

Posted on October 26th, 2006 by thetshirtnexus.
Categories: Marketing.

Well, it’s official. I have been paid to blog. I have $10 in my PayPal account because of the promotion. I haven’t seen any referral money (the second way you can benefit) but knowing that they did follow through on the “$10 if your post is picked promise” is reassuring.

They are still seeking posts if you’d like to try it for yourself. The link to the program is in the “widget” at the bottom of my original post on the topic if you missed it.

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Graphics Tutorial: Pop Art Inspired by Lichtenstein

Posted on October 25th, 2006 by thetshirtnexus.
Categories: Design.

Pop Art Tutorial

Here’s a great Photoshop tutorial for creating Lichtenstein style pop art (in case you need a memory jog, Lichtenstein pop art pieces often featured emotional damsels in distress who cry out in comic book bubbles).

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eComXpo Has Started

Posted on October 24th, 2006 by thetshirtnexus.
Categories: Marketing.

eComXpo

I almost forgot about this, having signed up so long ago.

eComXpo

It’s a virtual conference and floor show, you can watch presentations and explore the “floor show” where you can chat live with representatives from many companies, and get free goodies. Last time I attended I got $50 worth of free clicks from Yahoo’s ad network. There are also a lot of prize giveaways and a chat lounge for attendees.

While attending the expo you can still surf around and use your computer as you normally would, literally right now I am typing this while listening to the second keynote of the day about Google Analytics. Presentations are available after the show has ended but you need to pay to access most of the presentations.

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McDonald’s Monopoly Game and a Money Making Post

Posted on October 23rd, 2006 by thetshirtnexus.
Categories: Marketing.

McDonald's Monopoly

This post could alternatively be called, “Procrastination Can Lead to Strange Things”.

First, the back story. As most of you reading this probably know, I recently went on a road trip to attend CafePress Connect, a conference in San Francisco. On the way there I ate at McDonalds and took a cell phone picture meaning to talk about their Monopoly promotion. I didn’t get a chance to send it but it turns out it’s come in handy anyway.

Why? Two reasons. The first is now I can say what I meant to say then… McDonald’s Monopoly promotion, dispite having some problems, is their most popular promotion. I think it’s a great example of how a successful campaign taps into a shared theme. In this case, who among us has not played Monopoly? Who has not had the thrill of collecting all lots in a certain color group?

Heck, this promotion is so far reaching that when my friend and I arrived at my brother’s in San Francisco we talked about the promotion and he was saddened that I hadn’t remembered to take my pieces off the table after taking my picture so I could give them to him!
What does that mean for us T-shirt folks? Well it means go out and spend big bucks to tie into Monopoly! No. It means, go out and partner with McDonald’s because they are brilliant! Probably still not in your budget. But really, it means, tap into what your customers cherish in their childhood. Playing monopoly while eating my fries sure took me back. Though I must say I appreciated my chicken sandwich option which wasn’t available back then.

On to reason two of why the picture has come in handy. I’m sure you have noticed the widget in this post by now. It is a “Conversation widget”. If you join the conversation and also blog about McDonald’s I will get a referral fee, I believe I will also get money just by writing this blog post if it gets featured (one of the requisites is having a current picture from McDonald’s). Talk about another interesting promotion! Blog about McDonald’s, get featured in the widget and see what others have posted, and get money. Sounds a little snarky doesn’t it? Well it’s all “transparent” as you can see so to me this is better than folks posing as bloggers but really being ad folks. On my end, I’m just going to take advantage of the opportunity since I’m already procrastinating going to bed. We’ll see if it does as well as their Monopoly deal.

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Javascript Code to Auto Update Copyright Year

Posted on October 21st, 2006 by thetshirtnexus.
Categories: Website Tips.

Still pumped from CP Connect, I’ve been working on sprucing up some of my websites. Before I even got to more complicated things I noticed my copyright would soon be out of date. Copyright years for US residents should read the date of creation of the website to the last date the website was altered. In the case of my climbing site my copyright is from 2002 - 2006. I’ve used a javascript to auto update the last year for some other websites I own but I didn’t do it for this one for some reason. While googling for the script I used in the past, I came across an easier one to use which might help some of you out as well.

Here’s the explanation and cut and paste code. Essentially, you change the year to the first year you created your website and then drop the script where you’d want the copyright statement to appear and then add your name in regular html after it. If the year is any year but what you put in the copyright will be change to read 2005 - 2006 (or whatever the current year is).

As my friend Adam might say, easey peasey!

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